People support free software and

Thursday 28 March 2002 07.54 EST
First published on Thursday 28 March 2002 07.54 EST

People support free software and that is noble if the software is supposed to be free. But the majority of computer users seem to be happy ripping off software that is not supposed to be free, but is offered as shareware by very small companies just trying to make a modest living. Ambrosia Software, for example, found 104 out of 197 attempts to reregister one of its Macintosh utilities were fraudulent. You can bet that a lot of shareware and commercial software suppliers are going to follow Microsoft's lead and introduce product activation systems.